What do you use as “earth” in your benchwork, DG, rocks, dirt? I’m at the point where I need to decide what filler to use, and I don’t want to re-invent the wheel.
Thanks…
I assume you got my emails okay. 
Is it a secret 
Ralph
I know, but I’m sworn to secrecy below $1000.
tac, ig & The Foley Fast Freight Forwarding Boys
Yup, I got the emails. Sworn to secrecy as above.
Steve;
You mean to say that you can’t give us the dirt on Richard’s dirt?
Humpf!
David Meashey
I’d be happy to publish the emails if the author will grant permission.
Don’t ya just hate this tease… ?
Snicker.
Well, Richard, do we keep them swinging in the breeze?
Steve Featherkile said:
I'd be happy to publish the emails if the author will grant permission.Don’t ya just hate this tease… ?
Snicker.
Well, Richard, do we keep them swinging in the breeze?
Since I’ve decided not to run for political office it will be okay to release my emails.
Actually I received Steve’s email inquiry before I saw the post here. Thus the emails. Stay tuned.
This is only a teaser for Steve’s new book: “The Dirt on Richard”, subtitled “Dastardly Devious Deeds of Dirty Dick”.
Here’s the dirt on Richard’s dirt…
[b]Steve,
No mulch or top soil, etc. Just plain old dirt, rocks & whatever, anything that will eventually drain (more stones between the cedar roadbed strips), and then topped with ballast (#2 poultry grit). The grit I’ve used is called Cherry Stone which is I believe pink granite. It comes from a source in New Ulm Minnesota in 50# bags. I’m sure decomposed granite chips would work as well if available in your area. I had to add grit the first couple of years on the old areas but need hardly any at all now as everything has settled. Mosses have taken root even between the rails in places too and is easily removed if wanted but I leave most in place as it gives a nice short line look.
I do sift the natural dirt I use extensively on the railroad through a screen of hardware cloth to remove obtrusive chunks of flotsam and weeds, etc. This is used to top the areas beyond the tracks. After installing any large rocks I just pour the sifted dirt over them and let it fill in and take a natural slope. This plants the rocks and makes for a most natural look. Try and avoid using “pretty” rocks with disparate colors. The scene will look better if the rocks are mostly one general color (varying shades is fine) that is similar to the dirt used. If contrasting rocks are used try and group them together rather than scattering them about which will result in an unrealistic salt and pepper look.
Heavy rain will pool a bit in some low areas but drains down usually within a few minutes or so after the rains stop leaving a moist soil which hasn’t seemed to hurt either the PT benchwork or the painted cedar strips on the roadbed.
Probably more info than you need or want but just in case. Best of luck on your finish work. :-)[/b]
Richard
Wait, there is more…
[b]I didn’t have time to say everything in the last reply as the dinner bell sounded.
In a freeze anything on a bridge freezes first and thaws last. Your benchwork is by this definition a bridge and as such could quite possibly freeze the roots of any plants. My suggestion is first of all use annuals that will be expendable come winter. Water will also drain quickly in dry weather so a drip irrigation would be useful to keep everything green. By its very nature the raised benchwork lends itself well to installing the drip irrigation lines beneath the benchwork held by strapping and poked up through the scenery where needed. The small heads are unobtrusive and won’t show much at all.
For larger plants such as faux trees, etc., merely keep them in pots. A hole cut through the screening, lined with barrier cloth and framed from below can accomodate a pot set in up to its neck and concealed with dirt brought up around it. When winter comes just brush the dirt aside, pull up the pot(s) and place them in shelter until Spring.
Just one suggestion:
Just use the peat and other plant encouraging stuff in the areas you want major plantings. Even a mere 1-1/2" depth will encourage growth in some cases without any moist soil. You don’t need invasive growth over your tracks. The moss on my RR grows on its own with just the dirt, rocks and ballast and dies back a bit in the summer.
[/b]
There, everything anyone wanted to know about growing plants in an inch and a half of soil. 
Steve,
If you ever make it over to the Westside of the state, and you want/need some ballast be sure to stop by Manufacturer Minerals in Renton. http://g.co/maps/f2e2t
They have some nice rock called Bridge Topping, and another size called 0 grit? that makes for a good looking scale top ballast. They sell it in 50# and 100# bags.
The more I read out the POC and the benchwork it makes me want to design something similar.
Craig
Hi Steve, Don’t know if this is related to what your asking about but it seems to be. I have a table top railroad but miss the vegetation so about a year and a half ago I built some planter boxes into the table top and planted some trees and ground cover out in the direct all-day sun. We have long hot dry summers here and I wasn’t sure that this would work but I have to say that the plantings are thriving and have encouraged me to expand my program. Below are a few pictures of an area now under construction with new planter boxes built in. This view shows the planter boxes; they are built from Cedar fence boards, re-enforced with Cedar cleats and hung from the bottom of the bench work with metal strapping. The boxes are about 11 inches deep and 12 inches wide. They are lined with Weed-Block cloth stapled in place. The grey stuff is a cement stucco base over chicken wire for my rock/soil decoration.
(http://freightsheds.largescalecentral.com/users/rick_marty/_forumfiles/RRupdatefile/view3.jpg)
Here the boxes have been filled with a loam/mulch mixture and the plants put in place. The “trees” are left in their pots and buried and the ground cover spotted in on the surface. The rock and ground work (stucco) was all finished and colored before planting.
(http://freightsheds.largescalecentral.com/users/rick_marty/_forumfiles/RRupdatefile/view5.jpg)
Another view of the same area. You can see the Mini sprinklers in place, as the ground cover grows they become less obtrusive. The shrubbery on the back side of the bench will eventually become high and dense enough to provide a background for the table tops.
(http://freightsheds.largescalecentral.com/users/rick_marty/_forumfiles/RRupdatefile/view6.jpg)
Here is a shot taken today with a little ballast in place. We have all the new track in and are testing it with all the cars and engine combinations we can think of before we continue the ballasting.
(http://freightsheds.largescalecentral.com/users/rick_marty/_forumfiles/RRupdatefile/view7.jpg)
Anyway this is the way we are handling the benchtop planting in our warm climate and it seems to be working. Later Rick
That last shot looks great Rick. Having the scale trees in the near field and the full-size ones in the far-field combined with the ability to get a great low angle because of the bench work make for a very believable photo.
You know, there is something good to be said about a bench work outdoor layout.
Mine is raised up 2 to 3 feet on fill and still is a PITA to work on.
And with my bad knees, a bench work RR would be nice.
I was a firm believer in “on the ground”, until I started to actually OPERATE on the RR, now I’m all for the “If you can raise it up at all, do it”. Six inches or a foot can be disguised with rockwork and fill, but helps immensely when you’re leaning over to uncouple, or throw a switch.
Rick, what you have done is absolutely amazing. Winters here in beautiful Deer Park get down to - 20F. Not the coldest for sure, but cold enough that having anything but annuals on a bench probably would not work. I’ve toyed with the idea of trees in pots that I could bring into the shop in late fall, and may yet do that. I have enough trees in the yard that I can borrow them for scenery if need be.
I’m looking more at ground cover. Forgetmenots have promise. :lol:
Bob McCown said:Aside from all the usual reasons for raising a pike, I only have a small backyard, so in most places I cannot back away any further than two or three feet from the track. When I started out, on the ground because that was all I knew about garden railroads, all I could see was the tops of the trains. No good at all.
I was a firm believer in "on the ground", until I started to actually OPERATE on the RR, now I'm all for the "If you can raise it up at all, do it". Six inches or a foot can be disguised with rockwork and fill, but helps immensely when you're leaning over to uncouple, or throw a switch.
I think I’ve been through much the same type of machinations as Bob here.
I’ve been raising my own railroad, from its initial elevation at ground level, by 6" or so, as much as I had materials for, each summer, for the past five or six years. Any time there was a right-of-way decision to be made about going either up or down, I reminded myself, “Get it up, get it up.” It became my mantra. Today the railroad is knee to waist height everywhere. All that moving of dirt has been my main occupation… but for long enough!
All the heavy lifting of rock and brick and dirt for getting it up did improve my viewing angle, but not by very much. I cannot raise it any more by my method method of piling more rocks and bricks etc under the track. I had a brilliant idea. If I couldn’t raise the track I’d lower myself. I put some benches here and there around the pike.
Sitting on a bench does gives one a far better view in a small garden, but it does limit one’s movement somewhat!
Now, while it may work for some, I myself am not at all interested in sitting down to watch a locomotive play roundy-roundy with its own caboose.
I enjoy assembling trains, following them along the main, and performing switching operations along the right of way.
Knee-to-waist height or so worked well for the grandkids, but they are growing taller very quickly! This year I have decided that a) this hobby has got to be about more than humping rocks and dirt every weekend. and b) I want to run trains, operate a railroad, and certainly not spend any more of my precious leisure time in unpaid, unrewarding heavy construction work. Pretty scenery is far less important to me than operations; I’ll figure out scenery later, or not…
Today my situation is this: I have a main freightyard all planned, with the track roughly laid out and waiting for me on the ground back there.
Facing these serious expansion plans, a few weeks ago I contemplated the many tons of dirt and rock that I would need to put under that yard and said to myself, very loudly and clearly, “ENOUGH !!! NO WAY!!!”
I am 6’2" tall. Knee height is too low.
The switching pike that I set up in the breezeway every summer has always been at at table height. It also is too low for this geezer who sometimes suffers from a stiff back.
My freightyard will be built on a baseboard at kitchen counter height. I wouldn’t be surprised if the old railroad gets bypassed, or perhaps I’ll run a branch on a steep grade to make a connection; I don’t know for sure; at this point it’s entirely of secondary importance.
I do know that having trains I can see and reach and handle easily is to be my main priority, and “getting it up” for real, onto proper benchwork, will be the answer for me.
I have an indoor line at about shoulder level in some places … generally about chest height. Gives a great perspective. Also makes working on the scenery in the background … interesting.
I have an opening for a helper … must be very tall, very thin, and not mind wearing lots of plaster. …
Matthew (OV)
John Bouck AKA Geezer Gauger, You kinda’ confirmed things, don’t you think?
Thanks for your input… I feel for your knees.
Rick,
Your attached planter boxes are a great idea for someone that wants to bring a bit of garden to a bench work railroad. Makes for some swell photography too. I never thought of doing it that way but it really looks good.
Another possible way to get foliage behind the scene is to set potted trees on the ground behind the bench work allowing the tops of the plants (trees) to show from behind. The potted “trees” could be moved aside for maintenance access whenever needed.